Mar 10, 2021 - Economy

Roblox set to go public with $30 billion direct listing

Dan Primack

Illustration of a smartphone with a dollar sign cable — Illustration: Eniola Odetunde/Axios

Roblox, a San Mateo, Calif.-based social gaming platform for tweens and teens, will go public today via a direct listing. Its reference price of $45 per share would value the company just shy of $30 billion, and is the same price at which it raised private funding in January.

Why it matters: This is a major milestone for the creator economy movement, as Roblox last year paid game developers nearly $329 million.

Roblox raised over $850 million in VC funding, from firms like Altos Ventures, First Round Capital, Index Ventures, Meritech Capital Partners, Tiger Global, Altimeter and Dragoneer.

Over 7% of Roblox remains owned by a friends and family group who helped seed the company because they knew CEO Dave Baszucki when he was a teenager in Eden Prairie, Minnesota.

The bottom line: "Spend just a few minutes in it, and you'll see how the games push you toward spending money, which is how you get the $30 billion valuation. Same deal with Fortnite or any other 'free' game that's constantly tempting you to pay," said Stephen Totilo, author of the upcoming Axios Gaming newsletter (sign up)

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Roblox set to go public with $30 billion direct listing

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